Linkedin Algorithm Updates: Enhancing User Experience and Engagement

Linkedin algorithms: a lot is changing

First: welcome to Linkedin, the professional network!

The keyword? Professional! People here mean business.

Post your life elsewhere. You are here to add value.

We’re now more than 900 million professionals!

Here’s exactly what Linked wants:

? Experts who share their knowledge.

? Business people who build communities.

POSTS

Your content must be relevant to a specific audience.

If you are a specialist, share your knowledge freely!

And stay inside your circle of competence.

Your circle is small? It is okay :)

COMMENTS

You’ve been told to comment as much as possible.

This is not good advice anymore and here’s why.

Linkedin now looks at the people writing comments.

We were all annoyed by comments such as “amazing!”.

This trend won’t last because those will be seen as spam.

What matters now is the author and the quality of comments.

CATEGORIES

AI helps Linkedin to put posts into categories.

Is your post adding nothing (generic content)?

Is your post adding value (unique content)?

Is your post offering qualitative advice?

There are 3 Linkedin categories:

GREAT CONTENT

LOW-QUALITY

SPAM

LINKS

Be very careful when posting external links.

Many links? Your post will be seen as spam!

Why? Linkedin does not want you to leave.

Your link should be in the comment section.

FEED

If you don’t want to see a post in your feed, you can tell Linkedin.

User flagging will tell Linkedin to limit the reach of the post/author.

You don’t want to see something because it is in another language?

I suggested unfollowing the person in question instead of doing this.

CONTENT

If you add value, you’ll be rewarded with more followers and more visibility. If you post generic information, you’ll be less visible. If you post non-professional content, you won’t be rewarded. Linkedin wants users to know that they'll find interesting content here that they won't find anywhere else. That means that if you repost content already published on other social platforms, your posts won’t be promoted. If you have expert knowledge, opinions or advice, please share! Select your topics and subjects carefully!

STYLE

If you use AI-generated content, your grammar may be better but your style will be dull. Good grammar is essential because poorly written texts won’t be seen as professional but that’s it. Keep your unique tone and style. Are you serious? Stay serious. Casual? Stay casual. Be yourself!

ENGAGEMENT

I’ll shock you. There’s something known as "Linkedin viral farms". People join groups to “push” each other’s content by liking, reposting and commenting. This can lead to virality, but Linkedin is going to fight those artificial tactics.

User engagement remains very important during the first hour following your post. But sometimes your posts will go viral after 24 hours if a popular profile shares your content. However the goal on Linkedin isn’t to become viral. It is to build your own community, in your own industry, even if it is a niche!

PROFILE INTERACTIONS

There's another type of "engagement": users interacting with each other by tagging themselves in posts or comments. It can send a negative signal when you do not react with a "like" or with a comment after someone tagging you.

This is quite intuitive to grasp: by not reacting, to the algorithms, you appear unresponsive, inactive, and disinterested.

The other party as well might suffer from your lack of reaction. It seems that they made a mistake by tagging someone who will not react. Negative signals for both parties.

There's one exception: when low-quality profiles abusively tag high-quality profiles with the hope of eliciting a reaction, it is fair to assume that the negative signal will only concern the signal's sender.

TIMING

Yes, posting when people are online is better than posting when people are offline. I personally do not care: I’ll post what I want, whenever I want. I won’t be a slave to algorithms.

KEYWORDS

Yes, Linkedin’s algorithms rely on keywords. But using too many hashtags # could make your post hard to read or even spammy. Ideally, stick to 3 hashtags. Do I follow this rule? No!

LINKED PROFILE QUALITY

If your Linkedin profile is low-quality, your content will have less visibility.

It’s that simple. So what makes a high-quality profile? Endorsements? Recommendations? I don't think so. What makes your profile valuable is yourself, your posts and articles, your comments, and your videos — if you dare!

When I see profiles that only repost content, I think: they are generous and helping others, that's great! But where is the added value they provide?

CONCLUSION

Controversial observation: as much as we all love likes and shares, not every “like” has the same value. I’d rather have one “like” from someone who is a real expert than 10 likes from people who add very little to the industry.

Remember: the goal on Linkedin is value, not virality!

What do you think? What changes have you noticed? What tips could you give to the community?